1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to reagent compositions and their use in identifying and characterizing cells in samples of whole blood, and more particularly to reagent compositions and their use in (i) identifying reticulocytes; and (ii) simultaneously measuring the volume, hemoglobin concentration and hemoglobin content of large numbers of individual reticulocytes and erythrocytes, in a whole blood sample by light scatter and flourescence flow cytometry techniques.
2. Description of the Prior Art
In all the higher animals, blood consists of an aqueous fluid part (the plasma) in which are suspended corpuscles of various kinds: the red blood cells (erythrocytes), the white blood cells (leukocytes) and the blood platelets. Plasma has a composition comprising roughly 90% water, 9% protein, 0.9% salts and traces of other materials such as sugar, urea, uric acid and the like.
The cells or corpuscles of the peripheral blood (i.e. the blood outside the bone marrow) are divided into two main groups: erythrocytes, whose primary object is to transport oxygen and leukocytes, whose primary functions relate to the immune system and the destruction of materials foreign to the body. In addition to these two main groups, the blood also contains the so-called blood platelets which are important in hemostasis.
The final stages of erythrocyte maturation occur after their release from the bone marrow while these cells are circulating in the peripheral blood. These young red cells, or "reticulocytes", have lost their nucleus, and thus, their ability to divide or to synthesize ribonucleic acid (RNA). Although these functions have ceased, reticulocytes are still metabolically active and are capable of synthesizing protein, taking up iron for the synthesis of heme, and carrying out the necessary metabolic reactions required to maintain an energy-rich state. These cells are usually most easily distinguished from mature erythrocytes by exposing them to solutions of cationic dyes which react with the anionic RNA in the reticulocytes and precipitate into a fine or coarse stained "reticulum" within the reticulocytes, which gives the reticulocytes their name.
Although reticulocytes normally comprise about 0.5 to 2 percent of the total red blood cell population, this percentage can change dramatically under abnormal conditions. For example, reticulocyte counts have been used for many years as a diagnostic aid in studying blood dyscrasias, as an index of red blood cell regeneration following hemorrhage, as well as for monitoring early toxicity in chemotherapy of certain malignant diseases.
Nucleic acids (RNA and DNA) are polyanions which can be stained with practically any cationic dye. The RNA in reticulocytes can be stained with only a few cationic dyes [including Brilliant Cresyl Blue (BCG), New Methylene Blue (NMB), Auramine O (AuO), Acridine Orange (AO), Thiazole Orange (TO) and Pyronine Y (PY)]. Among these dyes, only a sub-set can be made to penetrate the cells (and therefore stain) rapidly. The sub-set includes NMB and AO. The rate of, and degree of staining of reticulocytes depends upon the extracellular concentration of the dye, the rate of penetration of the dye through the reticulocyte membrane, and the strength of the specific binding constant between the cationic dye and the reticulocyte RNA. The latter two properties are different, and not easily predictable, for each dye, so that trial and error are necessary to discover useful reticulocyte stains. Not all cationic substances are capable of penetrating intact red cells (and reticulocyte) membranes, and the nature of the anions which necessarily accompany the cations, can effect whether or not the cationic substance penetrates rapidly, slowly or not at all. Hydrophobic molecules generally penetrate red cell membranes faster than hydrophilic molecules, and small molecules generally penetrate membranes faster than large molecules. Only a sub-set of salts or buffers mixed with those cationic dyes which can stain reticulocytes permit rapid staining; that is the "right" dye with the "wrong" buffer can take "forever" to stain reticulocytes. Again, trial and error are necessary to discover useful formulations of reticulocyte staining mixtures. Thus, despite various "rules" which can be used as guides, it is not yet possible to predict, a priori, whether, and under which conditions any particular cationic dye may rapidly penetrate and stain reticulocytes.
The fundamental concept of flow cytometry is essentially the passing of cells, one at a time, through a specific sensing region. Typically, by means of hydrodynamic focusing, single cells are passed through the sensing zone, which consists of a focused light source and a detection system for the measurement of scattered, absorbed or fluorescent light. The effect a particle has on the light it intercepts can be detected in a number of ways. In general, the particle has a refractive index which is different than that of the medium in which it is suspended. It will therefore scatter light with which it is illuminated through a range of angles, and with varying intensities, that depend upon that refractive index difference, the particle's size, its shape and any internal variations in refractive index and structure as well as upon the wavelength of the illuminating light. (For homogeneous spheres, Mie Scattering Theory provides a complete description of the distribution and intensities of scattered light.) A particle may also absorb some of the incident light. In the latter case, a portion of the absorbed light may be reemitted as fluorescence, typically at a longer wavelength than the wavelength of the absorbed light.
These and other effects can be measured with light detectors arranged to measure different angular intervals of scattered light, of unscattered light and of fluorescent light.
When particles are as small as cells, typically less than 15 micrometers in diameter, the numbers of photons in the illuminating beam affected by their passage at high speed (typically hundreds to thousands of widely-spaced cells per second), and especially compared to the number of photons per second falling on the illuminated part of the suspension stream, [and compared to the background illumination of an absorption detector (and even a fluorescence detector)] can be very small. Therefore, the limits of sensitivity of detection of small particular differences between particles depends critically on the photon flux (which depends at least on the intrinsic "brightness" of the light source) and how large the perturbations of the photon flux are that are produced by other small and large differences between particles.
The main sources of interfering noise in absorption, scatter and fluorescence flow cytometry signals can be quite different for each kind of signal. To a first order approximation, the magnitudes of fluorescence signals from stained or unstained cells are almost uninfluenced by shape or orientation of the cells from which the signals arise, whereas scatter and absorption signals are very strongly influenced by shape and orientation. As an extreme example, the native biconcave shape of human erythrocytes has a profound effect on the absorption and scatter signals they generate; effects larger than the small absorption signals of typical classically stained reticulocytes. This is the main reason why, prior to the present co-pending invention described in U.S. application Ser. No. 07/802,593 filed Dec. 5, 1991 entitled "Reagent Compositions and Their Use in the Identification and Characterization of Reticulocytes in Whole Blood" filed concurrently herewith and assigned to the assignees of the present invention, absorption flow cytometry methods have not been useful for reticulocyte counting or generally for the measurement of low concentrations of absorbing molecules in cells. On the other hand, weakly fluorescence materials in cells or (for example, unbound fluorescent dyes) in their surrounding medium has virtually no effect on absorption or scatter signals.
But in fluorescence flow cytometry, when the light source is sufficiently intense, and stray light and system fluorescence have been minimized, the limit of sensitivity for the discrimination of selectively stained cells from unstained cells is set by the relative magnitude of the apparent "background fluorescence" from the components within the unstained cell and/or the level of fluorescence of the medium in the sample stream surrounding the stained and unstained cells. With reticulocyte stains, there is always some equilibrium concentration of dye in solution in the sample stream surrounding the cells. For a given level of binding to reticulum RNA, the ratio of external dye to reticulum-bound dye decreases as the specific binding constant of the dye to RNA increases. Therefore, the higher the binding constant, the lower the necessary external dye concentration, the lower the "background" signal and the higher the signal to noise. Also, if the fluorescence efficiency of the unbound dye is lower than the fluorescence efficiency of the reticulum-bound dye, improved signal to noise is achieved. In fact, the methods which utilize AuO, TO and Thioflavine T, depend upon differences in bound and unbound fluorescence efficiency. The preferred methods described hereinafter, however, depend mainly on high specific binding constants for the high signal to noise achieved, and in one case, the lower non-specific fluorescence of unstained cells at long (red) wavelengths.
Several semi-automated methods are available which can be used for counting the percentage of reticulocytes in an anti-coagulated sample of whole blood. In each of the existing methods, a diluent containing an organic cationic dye, such as AO, AuO or TO, is used to stain the RNA within the reticulocytes. The dye penetrates the cell membrane and binds to the RNA and usually precipitates a "reticulum" within each reticulocyte. The amount of the signal from stained RNA is roughly proportional to the RNA content. After proper staining, a fluorescence flow cytometer, equipped with the proper excitation light source (typically an argon ion laser emitting at 488 nm), and emission detection system, can be used to determine the percentage of reticulocytes in the effluent.
Illustrative methods for differentiating reticulocytes in whole blood samples using fluorescent dyes and flow cytometric methods are disclosed in the patent literature.
For example, U.S. Pat. No. 3,684,377 to Adams and Kamentsky discloses a dye composition for differential blood analysis including an aqueous solution of AO, and having a pH factor and osmolality within normal physiological ranges for human blood. The dye composition can be used for counting reticulocytes by measuring the presence or absence of a fluorescence signal with an erythrocyte scatter signal.
U.S. Pat. No. 3,883,247 to Adams discloses a similar method to that of Adams and Kamentsky using a dye composition including AO having a concentration of between 10.sup.-6 and 10.sup.-5 grams per ml.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,336,029 to Natale discloses a reagent composition comprising an aqueous solution of the dye AO, citrate ion and paraformaldehyde at a pH of about 7.4 and an isotonic osmolality. The concentrations of the various ingredients were selected to maximize dye uptake of the reticulocytes and platelets, and provided for dye uptake to be achieved within 2-5 minutes of mixing the blood sample and reagent composition. An automated method for detection of platelets and reticulocytes utilizing the Natale reagent is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,325,706 to Gershman, et al.
In the reagent disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,707,451 to Sage, Jr., reticulocytes are stained with thioflavin T or chrysaniline. A whole blood sample was found to be effectively stained by mixing a 25 .mu.l aliquot of the dye in an isotonic saline solution (0.2 mg/ml) with 10 .mu.l of anticoagulated whole blood with the mixture incubated for about 7 minutes.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,883,867 to Lee, et al. discloses a dye composition for staining RNA or DNA. The staining composition includes TO as the preferred dye compound. The reticulocytes are stained in a minimum time of 30 minutes.
A reagent for reticulocyte counting of flow cytometric techniques is described in U.S. Pat. No. 4,971,917 to Kuroda which contains a carbonate salt to reduce the non-specific staining of the mature erythrocytes by the dye, e.g. AuO, to prevent the mature erythrocytes from being erroneously counted as reticulocytes when analyzed by fluorescence flow cytometry.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,981,803 describes a reagent for reticulocyte counting which comprises two solutions, namely a stock solution for staining in which a dye AuO is dissolved in a non-aqueous solvent and a buffer solution which satisfies the optimum staining conditions.
Another reticulocyte staining reagent for fluorescence flow cytometric techniques including AuO is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,985,174 to Kuroda, et al. This reference teaches an incubation time of the reagent and sample of anywhere between 30 seconds and 20 minutes.
As noted above, only a small sub-set of cationic dyes selectively stain reticulocytes, and only a smaller sub-set of these penetrate reticulocytes rapidly. The cationic dye compounds of the present invention stain the reticulocytes in less than 5 minutes so that reticulocyte analysis by flow cytometry can be performed shortly after the blood sample and the reagent composition are mixed together, thus making the present invention readily adaptable for automated procedures.
Quaternized AO derivatives for quantitating reticulocytes are described in copending U.S. patent application Ser. No. 07/444,255 filed Dec. 1, 1989 by Fan and Fischer entitled "Compounds and Reagent Compositions and Their Use in the Quantitative Determination of Reticulocytes in Whole Blood" now U.S. Pat. No. 5,075,556, which is incorporated herein by reference. The Fan, et al. reagent contains 10.sup.-6 gram per ml of an AO derivative in a buffer solution including paraformaldehyde and potassium oxalate. This reagent composition stains reticulocytes to enable the quantitative fluorescence flow cytometric analysis of reticulocytes in a blood sample. Neither this reagent nor any of the above-mentioned reagents contain a sphering agent to prevent orientational noise problems as discussed below, and neither permit simultaneous determination of other diagnostically significant parameters such as volume and hemoglobin concentration of the reticulocytes and erythrocytes on a cell-by-cell basis.
Shapiro and Stevens disclose the use of Oxazine 750 for the determination of DNA content by flow cytometry in Flow Cytometry of DNA Content Using Oxazine 750 or Related Laser Dyes With 633 nm Excitation, Cytometry, Vol. 7, pp. 107-110 (1986). The-cells are stained by 10 .mu.M to 30 .mu.M of Oxazine 750, and are fixed by the addition of ethanol for the DNA determination. Shapiro and Stevens claim that Oxazine 750 does not appear to stain RNA within the cells. Moreover, such protocols with Oxazine 750 do not permit reticulocyte counting or simultaneous determination of other diagnostically significant red blood cell parameters such as volume and hemoglobin concentration on a cell-by-cell basis.
As mentioned above, human and many other mammalian red blood cells have the shape of biconcave disks. The amount of light scattered by such asymmetric red blood cells varies with the orientation of the cell. Accordingly, two identical red blood cells will generate very different scattered light signals as they pass through the sensing zone unless their orientations in the zone are identical. Two red blood cells which are identical, except for the presence in one of a small amount of stained reticulum, generally produce large signal differences on scattered light detectors because of their different orientations.
U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,575,490 and 4,412,004 to Kim and Ornstein teach a method for the elimination of orientational noise in the measurement of the volume of red blood cells in a flow cytometer. Their method involves isovolumetric sphering of unstained red blood cells to eliminate any orientational differences between the cells to permit more precise and accurate measurement of cell volume. Each red blood cell is converted from a biconcave shape to a perfect sphere by a surfactant sphering agent. A "buffering" protein and/or an aldehyde fixing agent are used with the sphering agent to prevent lysis of the erythrocytes. The anionic surfactants described by Kim and Ornstein cannot be used with reticulocyte stains because they have been found to react rapidly with and precipitate the cationic dyes used to stain and precipitate the reticulum.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,735,504 to Tycko discloses the red blood cell channel of the TECHNICON H.sup.. 1 system, a flow cytometer which provides a fully automated method and means for determining the individual and mean erythrocyte volumes (MCV), and individual and mean corpuscular hemoglobin concentrations (MCHC) of the erythrocytes in an anticoagulated whole blood sample. In this method, the red blood cells in a two microliter aliquot of a whole blood sample are first diluted, and then isovolumetrically sphered using the Kim and Ornstein method just described. After a twenty second incubation period, these cells are passed, essentially one at a time, through the illuminated measurement zone within the red cell channel of the analyzer. The magnitude of the light scattered by these cells into two separate angular intervals is measured. The choice of light source and detection angles are critical in this application. When the light source is a helium neon laser, which emits light at 633 nm, the two scattered light collection angle intervals are two to three degrees (2.degree.-3.degree.) and five to fifteen (5.degree.-15.degree.) degrees. Once the level of the scattered light in each interval is known for a cell, the volume and hemoglobin concentration for that cell are determined by comparison with values predicted by Mie scattering theory. The volume (V) and hemoglobin concentration (HC) for each cell are stored in memory, and the MCV and MCHC are calculated at the completion of the sample measurement cycle by techniques known in the art as discussed in Tycko. The V and HC distribution cytogram and the V and HC histograms are produced using these calculations.
Neither of the above methods distinguishes between reticulocytes and non-reticulocytes, and the methods as previously described and practiced cannot be used to determine separately, the diagnostically significant parameters of the reticulocytes and erythrocytes such as volume and hemoglobin concentration on a cell-by-cell basis.
Another difficulty in monitoring reticulocyte counts with a flow cytometer is difficulty in differentiating between reticulocyte detection signals, mature red blood cell signals, and system noise. The stained strands of RNA are numerous in young reticulocytes, and generate signals of relative large magnitude when detected by a flow cytometer. However, more mature cells contain less stained RNA, and generate smaller signals which may be masked by the noise of the flow cytometer measuring system.
There exists a need for methods and reagents useful for identifying reticulocytes and simultaneously measuring separately the volume, hemoglobin concentration and hemoglobin content of reticulocytes and erythrocytes in a whole blood sample by light scatter and absorption or fluorescence flow cytometry techniques.
We started with the premise that we wanted to use a cationic dye in a variant of well-known art to stain the reticulum. We were also interested in developing flow cytometric methods which could utilize fluorescence to detect reticulocytes. We also hoped, by using isovolumetric sphering and the aforenoted methods of Tycko, that for a fluorescence method, we would be able to simultaneously measure reticulocyte and mature red cell volume and hemoglobin on a cell-by-cell basis using a reagent which also selectively stained reticulocytes. (Note, if the sphering is complete, not isovolumetric, but some known factor X of isotonicity, using Tycko's method with a correction by 1/X for volume and a correction by X for protein, e.g. hemoglobin, concentration, original values can be calculated.)
To utilize Tycko's method, a light source which emits monochromatic light in a region where hemoglobin is very transparent is required; typically a light source like a red helium neon (HeNe) laser, or a laser with even longer wavelength. This means that if that wavelength is also to be used for the absorption measurement, the dye must be a blue dye with a strong absorption of red light.
If the same dye is to be used for fluorescence, it must have a reasonably high quantum efficiency and Stoke's shift, as well as a high binding constant, so that it can be used at a low enough concentration so that stream fluorescence will not unacceptably degrade fluorescence signal to noise ratio. It was discovered that Oxazine 750 not only satisfied the requirements for an absorption/scatter method, but also for a fluorescence/scatter method for determining reticulocyte RNA concentration, cell count and mature and reticulocyte cell volume and hemoglobin content on a cell-by-cell basis. In contrast, NMB, which has a very low fluorescence efficiency, fails for such a fluorescence/scatter method.
Alternatively, at added cost and complexity, using a dye to stain reticulocytes, which fluoresces green to red when excited with blue light, such as AO, AOEOH, TO, AuO, by adding an argon ion or HeCd laser with a 488 nm or 441 nm emission line, and used to illuminate the flow cell coaxially with the red laser, a method is implemented which also permits simultaneous determination of reticulocyte RNA concentration, cell count and mature and reticulocyte cell volume and hemoglobin content on a cell-by-cell basis.
We explored non-ionic, cationic and zwitterionic surfactants for compatibility with cationic dyes, and as red cell sphering agents as would be suggested by the teaching of Kim and Ornstein. As in the Kim and Ornstein method, we used a protein (typically bovine serum albumin) to "buffer" the concentration of the surfactants to slow down red cell lysis. A number of such surfactants (e.g. Triton X100 and Laurylpropylamidobetaine) worked satisfactorily. We then inadvertently discovered that Laurylpropylamidobetaine and some other zwitterionic surfactants (e.g. DAPS and TDAPS) did not require protein buffering to delay red cell lysis, and are ideal alternate sphering agents for all kinds of blood cells for the methods of Kim and Ornstein. Because they do not require protein buffering, they permit a stable and simpler reagent to be manufactured. (The fixing steps of Kim and Ornstein are no longer obligatory; alternately, the problems of bacterial growth in protein-containing reagents is also avoided.) This invention is the subject of co-pending U.S. application Ser. No. 07/802,674 filed Dec. 5, 1991 now U.S. Pat. No. 5,284,771 entitled "Reagent Compositions and Their Use in Sphering Cells", filed concurrently herewith and assigned to the assignees of the present invention.